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AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH Cracking cloned coconut MARKETING Dairy drive developed A growing interest in the health and nutritional benefits of dairy products in Vietnam could open up marketing opportunities for Australian exporters. The Vietnamese government is encouraging development of a domestic dairy industry but the country depends overwhelmingly on imported products, according to UQ senior lecturer in agribusiness Dr Kim Bryceson. Dr Bryceson has just returned from Vietnam with final-year UQ Gatton agribusiness students conducting a market assessment for Total Foodtec Marketing. “Doing business in a country like Vietnam presents special challenges with virtually no food cool supply chain and very different marketing systems,” Dr Bryceson said. The team visited traditional wet markets in Ho Chi Minh as well as modern supermarkets where shelves Student Cherie Warburton conducting an interview in Vietnam were stacked high with long-life and tinned milk products. They also met government officials in Hanoi. Business models were put together in a presentation to the Total Foodtec Marketing Board. Export Manager Dustin Boughton said the company was interested in the market potential for a range of speciality products including milk powders and cream cheese. The company specialises in sourcing products from Australian processors to match the needs of food manufacturers and about 40 percent of its business is based on exports. “We don’t export to Vietnam and we saw assessment by the agribusiness students as a costeffective way of judging the market potential,” Mr Boughton said. UQ Gatton Agribusiness Associate Professor Ray Collins said the client company awarded 40 percent of the subject marks, making the program unique. UQ researchers are aiming for a world breakthrough in coconut cloning. An $800,000 grant from the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) will support the first stage of a three-year project seeking cloning techniques for commercial production of elite plants. Team leader Associate Professor Steve Adkins said the project would involve scientific collaboration in the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. Dr Adkins, of the School of Land and Food Sciences, said coconuts were economically important in many Asian countries. He said research would also focus on embryo transplant technology, which had important implications for the safe transfer of germplasm. “Plant quarantine is a major issue. Dr Adkins (left) and colleague Yohannes Samosir. There is a need to be able to share superior coconut germplasm internationally without the risk of transmitting serious pests and diseases,” he said. “The embryo can be removed from a coconut and implanted in a surrogate host. From this single nut, cloning techniques can be used to rapidly propagate plants with the desired traits.” Dr Adkins said the third element to the project would be molecular biology research on coconuts. The plant’s genetic make-up would be studied to identify any unwanted changes during the cloning process. Dr Adkins says it might be possible to breed attractive, fast growing plants that did not bear fruit, important where coconuts are grown for amenity and falling coconuts pose an injury hazard. TEACHING AND LEARNING WEEK 2002 6 Valerie Powell ANIMAL STUDIES Mammoth lesson in anatomy What do woolly mammoths, flexible assessment and increased student satisfaction have in common? The answer is… they are all outcomes of Project Woolly Mammoth, which is an innovative problem-based learning exercise that teaches anatomy and physiology by asking students to design animals to fit specific habitats. The project developed by Valerie Powell, UQ Gatton’s co-ordinator of animal anatomy and physiology in the School of Animal Studies, is a handson way of learning about these content-heavy subjects. Ms Powell’s aim is to encourage students to think about the information they are learning and to understand why and how animals are different. “Students design their own fictitious mammal that has musculoskeletal, digestive, respiratory and reproductive systems that would allow them to exist and reproduce in a given environment,” she said. “For example, if you are designing an animal with wings, does it have two legs or four legs?” She says students find this practical assignment a great way to make connections between the structure and function of the whole animal as they create their own “Woolly Mammoth”. The project has been running for three years and students completing the assignment demonstrated “a better knowledge of anatomical topography and anatomical detail in their end-ofsemester assessment,” Ms Powell says. UQ NEWS, DecEMBER 2002
Christmas came early to the UQ St Lucia campus when Channel Seven filmed a helicopter sequence at the Alumni Teaching Garden on November 22. This was for a special Santa sequence being pre-produced for this year’s Golden Casket Lord Mayor’s Christmas Carols. “The gardens at UQ were the perfect location for our sequence, which is set in the South American jungle,” said Unit Production Manager Tina Ralphs. “With exams in progress we only had an hour to film with the helicopter, but UQ staff helped us make it happen.” The Golden Casket Lord Mayor’s Christmas Carols will be held live at the Riverstage in the City Botanic Gardens on December 14. The show starts at 7.30 pm, with pre-show entertainment from 6.30 pm. Channel Seven will telecast the program on December 21 at 6.30 pm. Reindeer-free rainforest Bruce Stewart from UQ Security (right) keeps an eye on Santa and his Channel 7 helpers Greg Rogers (left), Annette Caltabiano and Tina Ralphs. UQ NEWS, decEMBER 2002 7
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